Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (Near East London), BCMM, Eastern Cape, South Africa

Phase 1 Archaeological Impact Assessment –

- 30 November 2014 -

Sello Mokhanya (Eastern Cape Provincial Heritage Resources Authority – EC PHRA) E-mail: [email protected]; Tel: 043 745 0888; Postal Address: N/A

Jaclyn Smith (Terreco Environmental) E-mail: [email protected]; Tel: 043 721 1502; Postal Address: 57 Jarvis Road, Berea, East London, 5241

Karen van Ryneveld (ArchaeoMaps) E-mail: [email protected]; Tel: 084 871 1064; Postal Address: Postnet Suite 239, Private Bag X3, Beacon Bay, 5205

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the , (near East London), BCMM, EC 2

– – o o ’ o –

–

– 3

Phase 1 Archaeological Impact Assessment – Executive Summary Terreco have been appointed as independent EAP by Aurecon, on behalf of the project proponent, the BCMM, to prepare the BAR and EMPr reports for the proposed construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development, to be situated at general development co-ordinate S32°59’05.5”; E27°39’02.1”, near East London, BCMM, Eastern Cape, South Africa. The development comprises the construction of an 80m bridge across the Buffalo River and an approximate 3km access road, linking the Needs Camp and Potsdam villages. Construction material for the development will be sourced from 1 borrow pit [NCP_BP01]. (For application purposes the borrow pit component of the development is reported on separately.)

ArchaeoMaps was appointed by Terreco to conduct the Phase 1 AIA for the proposed construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road component of the development. The Phase 1 AIA comprises a specialist component to the project’s HIA, with findings and recommendations thereof to be included in the BAR and EMPr.

Project Area: Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development, near East London, BCMM, Eastern Cape [1:50,000 Map Ref –3227DC].

Coverage & Gap Analysis: Pre-feasibility and field assessment.

Field Methodology: One day field assessment; GPS co-ordinates – Garmin GPSmap 62s; Photographic documentation – Pentax K20D. Site significance assessment – SAHRA 2007 system. Summary: o No archaeological or cultural heritage developmental ‘Fatal Flaws’ identified; o Development will have a low positive impact on the contemporary (spiritual) cultural environment.

Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development, near East London, BCMM, Eastern Cape NCP-S1 Contemporary – Place of Worship S32°59’05.2”; E27°38’46.7” Temporary conservation (temporary signage at the time of construction; observation of religious / ceremonial requirements) NCP-S2 Stone Age – ESA & MSA (low density S32°59’19.7”; E27°39’34.6” Destruction occurrence) (site destruction without the developer having to apply for an EC PHRA Site Destruction Permit)

– With reference to archaeological and cultural heritage compliance, as per the requirements of the NHRA 1999, it is recommended that the proposed construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development, near East London, Eastern Cape, proceeds as applied for, provided the developer complies with the above listed recommendations. The EC PHRA HIA Comment will state legal requirements for development to proceed, or reasons why, from a heritage perspective, development may not be further considered.

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 4

Pre-feasibility Assessment...... 11 – Field Assessment...... 18 – °’”°’” – °’”°’”

– 5

– –

– 6

°’” °’”

’  ’ o o o o o ‘’ o o ‘ ’

°’” °’” – o o – – o –

– 7

– 8

–

– 9

’

– – ² ²

o – ’

– 10

o o – – – – – – –

– –

’

– 11

Pre-feasibility Assessment

–

– – – – –

o o o o o

– 12

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o ‘’

o o o o o

’ ’

– 13

o –

–

– – ’ – – o –

– 14

– 15

–

°′″°′″ — ’ °′″°′″ ’ °′″°′″ ’ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ °′″°′″ ’

– 16

’ ‘’

’’ ’ ‘’ ‘ ’ ‘’ ‘’ ‘’ ‘’‘’ ‘’– ‘’ ‘’’ ’ ‘ ’ ‘ ’

‘… ’– ’ … ’

– 17

’ ’ –

– 18

Field Assessment

o o

– 19

–

– 20

– 21

– 22

– 23

– °’”°’”

‘ ’ ‘’

o  ‘– ’  

– 24

– °’”°’”

°’”°’” ≤

o 

– 25

o ˂ o o o o

–

– 26

–

– 27

– – ‘– ’

o o

‘ ’ ‘ ’ ‘ ’

‘’ ‘’ ‘’‘’‘’ ’

– 28

‘ ’

‘’ ‘’ ‘’‘’ ‘’ ‘’ ‘’ ’ ‘’‘’‘’ ‘’

–

‘’‘’

– 29

No archaeological or cultural heritage ‘Fatal Flaws’ were identified during the Phase 1 AIA for the proposed construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development. Development will have a low positive impact on the contemporary (spiritual) cultural environment.

With reference to archaeological and cultural heritage compliance, as per the requirements of the NHRA 1999, it is recommended that the proposed construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road development, near East London, Eastern Cape, proceeds as applied for, provided the developer complies with the below listed recommendations.

The EC PHRA HIA Comment will state legal requirements for development to proceed, or reasons why, from a heritage perspective, development may not be further considered.

Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road

o Should any archaeological or cultural heritage resources, including human remains / graves, as defined and protected by the NHRA 1999, and not reported on in this report be identified during the course of development the developer should immediately cease operation in the vicinity of the find and report the site to the EC PHRA and an ASAPA accredited CRM archaeologist. Human remains confirmed younger than 60 years are to be reported directly to the nearest police station. Simplified guide to the identification of archaeological sites:  Stone Age – Knapped stone display flakes that appear unnatural and may result in similar type ‘shaped’ stones often concentrated in clusters or forming a distinct layer in the geological stratigraphy. ESA shapes may represent ‘pear’ or oval shaped stones, often in the region of 10cm in length or larger. Typical MSA types include blade-like or triangular shaped stones often associated with randomly shaped stones that display use or edge-wear around the rim of the artefact. LSA types may well be small, informally shaped stones, often associated with bone, pieces of charcoal and in cases ceramic shards. Rock Art – Includes both painted and engraves images. Shell Middens – Include compact shell lenses that may be quite extensive in size or small ephemeral scatters of shell food remains, often associated with LSA artefact remains, but may also be of MSA and Iron Age cultural association.  Iron Age – Iron Age sites are often characterized by stone features, i.e. the remains of former livestock enclosures or typical household remains, huts are often identified by either mound or depression hollows. Typical artefacts include ceramic remains, farming equipment, beads and trade goods, metal artefacts (including jewelry) etc. Remains of the ‘Struggle’ – events, histories and landmarks associated therewith are often, based on cultural association, classed as part of the Iron Age heritage of South Africa.  Colonial Period – Built environment remains, either urban or rural, are of a western cultural affiliation with typical artefacts representing early western culture, including typical household remains, trade and manufactured goods, such as old bottles, porcelain and metal artefacts. War memorial remains including the vast array of associated graves and the history of the Industrial Revolution form important parts of South Africa’s Colonial Period heritage. o Should any registered Interested & Affected Party (I&AP) wish to be consulted in terms of Section 38(3)(e) of the NHRA 1999 (Socio- cultural consultation / SAHRA SIA) it is recommended that the developer / EAP ensures that the consultation be prioritized within the timeframe of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 30

₁ ²

– 31

–

– 32

–

‘’

– 33

Date / Broad Outline of Cultural Periods Hominid / Human Evolution Period in Southern Africa Present e 1,500 n e c o

l o H 200

0 / AD 12kya Far East to the Americas e n

32kya e c o East Indian Islands to t s

i Australia e

64kya l P

r e p

75kya p nd U 2 Diaspora from Africa • Out of Africa Model • Multi Regional Model

128kya e n e c o t s 195kya i e l P

e l

250kya d d i India to Far East & 500kya M East Indian Islands 730kya e n

1Mya st e 1 Diaspora c

o from Africa t s - Africa to i e l

Near East &

l P a

r Europe l r u

1.5Mya n t e l o

u w a c

c i o & r

L f l a A

c i n s i

y n h

1.7Mya o i p

t n u l a o e m v n u e e H c o 2.5Mya i l P

4.15Mya

– 34

Archaeologically the southern African cultural environment is roughly divided into the Stone Age, the Iron Age and the Colonial Period, including its subsequent Industrial component. This cultural division has a rough temporal association beginning with the Stone Age, followed by the Iron Age and the Colonial Period. The division is based on the identified primary technology used. The hunter-gatherer lifestyle of the Stone Age is identified in the archaeological record through stone being the primary raw material used to produce tools. Iron Age people, known for their skill to work iron and other metal, also practiced agriculture and animal husbandry. Kingships and civilizations associated with the Iron Age are indicative of a complex social hierarchy. The Colonial Period is marked by the advent of writing, in southern Africa primarily associated with the first European travelers (Mitchell 2002).

During the latter part of the Later Stone Age (LSA) hunter-gatherers shared their cultural landscape with both pastoralists and Iron Age people, while the advent of the Colonial Period in South Africa is marked by a complex cultural mosaic of people; including LSA hunter-gatherers, pastoralists, Later Iron Age farming communities and Colonial occupation.

DNA studies indicates that humans and chimpanzees shared a common ancestor between 6-8Mya (Sibley & Ahlquist 1984). By 4Mya, based on fossil evidence from Ethiopia and Kenya, hominins (humans and their immediate fossil ancestors and relatives) had already evolved. The earliest fossils are ascribed to Ardipithecus ramidus (4.4Mya), succeeded by Australopithecus anamensis (4.2-3.9Mya). These fossils are inferred to lie at the base from which all other hominins evolved (Leakey et al. 1995; White et al. 1994).

In South Africa the later hominins are classed into 3 groups or distinct genera; Australopithecus (gracile australopithecines), Paranthropus (robust australopithecines) and Homo. South Africa has 3 major hominin sites: Taung in the North-West Province, where Raymond Dart identified the first Australopithecus fossil in 1924 (Dart 1925); The Cradle of Humankind (Sterkfontein Valley) sites in Gauteng, the most prolific hominin locality in the world for the period dating 3.5-1.5Mya which have yielded numerous Australopithecus, Paranthropus and limited Homo fossils (Keyser et al. 2000; Tobias 2000); and Makapansgat in the Limpopo Province, where several more specimens believed to be older than most of the Cradle specimens were discovered (Klein 1999).

A. africanus, represented at all 3 sites are believed to have been present on the South African landscape from about 3Mya. From approximately 2.8Mya they shared, at least in the Cradle area, the landscape with P. robustus and from roughly 2.3Mya with early forms of Homo (Clarke 1999). Global climatic cooling around 2.5Mya may have stimulated a burst of species turnover amongst hominins (Vrba 1992); the approximate contemporary appearance of the first stone tools suggests that this was a critical stage in human evolution. But exactly which early hominin population is to be accredited as the ancestor of Homo remains elusive.

H. ergaster is present in the African palaeo-anthropological record from around 1.8Mya and shortly thereafter the first exodus from Africa is evidenced by H. erectus specimens from China, Indonesia and even Europe (Klein 1999).

2.1) The Earlier Stone Age In South Africa the only Earlier Stone Age (ESA) Oldowan lithic assemblage comes from Sterkfontein Cave. The predominant quartz assemblage is technologically very simple, highly informal and inferred to comprise exclusively of multi-purpose tools (Kuman et al. 1997). The latter part of the ESA is characterized by the Acheulean Industrial Complex, present in the archaeological record from at least 1.5Mya. Both H. ergaster and P. robustus may be accredited with the production of these tools. The association between stone tools and increased access to meat and marrow supporting the greater dietary breath of Homo may have been vital to Homo’s evolutionary success; and the eventual extinction of the robust australopithecines (Klein 1999).

Probably the longest lasting artefact tradition ever created by hominins, the Acheulean is found from Cape Town to north-western Europe and India, occurring widely in South Africa. Despite the many sites it is still considered a ‘prehistoric dark age’ by many archaeologists, encompassing one of the most critical periods in human evolution; the transition from H. ergaster to archaic forms of H. Sapiens (Klein 1999).

The Acheulean industry is characterized by handaxes and cleavers as fosilles directeurs (signatory artefact types), in association with cores and flakes. Handaxes and cleavers were multi-purpose tools used to work both meat and plant matter (Binneman & Beaumont 1992). Later Acheulean flaking techniques involved a degree of core preparation that allowed a single large flake of predetermined shape and size to be produced. This Victoria West technique indicates an origin within the Acheulean for the Levallois technique of the Middle Stone Age (Noble & Davidson 1966). The lithic artefact component was supplemented by wood and other organic material (Deacon 1970).

2.2) The Middle Stone Age The Middle Stone Age (MSA), dating from approximately 500kya to 40-27/23kya is interpreted as an intermediate technology between the Acheulean and the Later Stone Age (LSA) (Goodwin & van Riet Lowe 1929). The MSA is typologically characterized by the absence of handaxes and cleavers, the use of prepared core techniques and the production of blades, triangular and convergent flakes, with convergent dorsal scars and faceted striking platforms, often produced by means of the Levallois technique (Volman 1984). The widespread occurrence of MSA technology across Africa and its spread into much of Eurasia in Oxygen Isotope Stage (OIS) 7 is viewed as part of a process of population dispersal associated with both the ancestors of the later Neanderthals in Europe and anatomically modern humans in Africa (Foley & Lahr 1997).

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 35

After the riches offered by the Cradle sites and Makapansgat, southern Africa’s Middle Pleistocene fossil record is comparatively poor. Early Middle Pleistocene fossil evidence suggests an archaic appearance and fossils are often assigned to H. heidelbergensis and H. sapiens rhodesiensis (Rightmire 1976). Modern looking remains, primarily from Border Cave (KwaZulu-Natal) and Klasies River Mouth (Eastern Cape) raised the possibility that anatomically modern humans had, by 120kya, originated south of the Sahara before spreading to other parts of the world (Brauer 1982; Stringer 1985). Subsequent studies of modern DNA indicated that African populations are genetically more diverse and probably older than those elsewhere (Cann et al. 1994). Combined, the fossil and genetic evidence underpins the so-called Out of Africa 2 model (arguing that gene flow and natural selection led regional hominin populations along distinct evolutionary trajectories after Homo’s expansion from Africa in the Lower Pleistocene Out of Africa 1 model) of modern human origins and the continuing debate as to whether it should be preferred to its Multiregional alternative (arguing that modern humans evolved more or less simultaneously right across the Old World) (Mellars & Stringer 1989; Aitken et al. 1993; Nitecki & Nitecki 1994).

Persuasive evidence of ritual activity or bodily decoration is evidenced by the widespread presence of red ochre at particularly MSA 2 sites (after Volman’s 1984 MSA 1-4 model; Hensilwood & Sealy 1997), while evidence from Lion Cave, Swaziland, indicates that specularite may have been mined as early as 100kya (Beaumont 1973). Evidence for symbolic behavioral activity is largely absent; no evidence for rock art or formal burial practices exists.

2.3) The Later Stone Age Artefacts characteristic of the Later Stone Age (LSA) appear in the archaeological record from 40/27-23kya and incorporates micolithic as well as macrolithic assemblages. Artefacts were produced by modern H. sapien or H. sapien sapien, who subsisted on a hunter-gatherer way of life (Deacon 1984; Mitchell 2002).

According to Deacon (1984) the LSA can temporally be divided into 4 broad units directly associated with climatic, technological and subsistence changes: 1. Late Pleistocene microlithic assemblages (40-12kya); 2. Terminal Pleistocene / early Holocene non-microlithic assemblages (12-8kya); 3. Holocene microlithic assemblages (8kya to the Historic Period); and 4. Holocene assemblages with pottery (2kya to the Historic Period) closely associated with the influx of pastoralist communities into South Africa (Mitchell 2002).

Elements of material culture characteristic of the LSA reflect modern behavior. Deacon (1984) summarizes these as: 1. Symbolic and representational art (paintings and engravings); 2. Items of personal adornment such as decorated ostrich eggshell, decorated bone tools and beads, pendants and amulets of ostrich eggshell, marine and freshwater shells; 3. Specialized hunting and fishing equipment in the form of bows and arrows, fish hooks and sinkers; 4. A greater variety of specialized tools including bone needles and awls and bone skin-working tools; 5. Specialized food gathering tools and containers such as bored stone digging stick weights, carrying bags of leather and netting, ostrich eggshell water containers, tortoiseshell bowls and scoops and later pottery and stone bowls; 6. Formal burial of the dead in graves (sometimes covered with painted stones or grindstones and accompanied by grave goods); 7. The miniaturization of selected stone tools linked to the practice of hafting for composite tools production; and 8. A characteristic range of specialized tools designed for making some of the items listed above.

 Rock Art Rock Art is one of the most visible and informative components of South Africa’s archaeological record. Research into LSA ethnography (as KhoiSan history) has revolutionized our understanding of both painted and engraved (petroglyph) images, resulting in a paradigm shift in Stone Age archaeology (Deacon & Dowson 2001). Paintings are concentrated in the Drakensberg / Maluti mountains, the eastern Free State, the Cape Fold Mountains, the Waterberg Plateau and the Soutpansberg mountains. Engravings on the other hand are found throughout the Karoo, the western Free State and North-West Province (Mitchell 2002). Both forms of LSA art drew upon a common stock of motifs, derived from widely shared beliefs and include a restricted range of naturalistically depicted animals, geometric imagery, human body postures and non-realistic combinations of human and animal figures (anthropomorphic figurines). LSA Rock Art is closely associated with spiritual or magical significance (Lewis-Williams & Dowson 1999).

Aside from LSA or KhoiSan Rock Art, thus art produced by both hunter-gatherer and pastoralist and agro-pastoralist groups, Rock Art produced by Iron Age populations are known the be present towards the north of the country.

 Shell Middens (‘Strandloper’ Cultures) South Africa’s nearly 3,000km coastline is dotted by thousands of shell middens, situated between the high water mark and approximately 5km inland, bearing witness to long-term exploitation of shellfish mainly over the past 12,000 years. These LSA shell middens are easily distinguishable from natural accumulations of shells and deposits can include bones of animals eaten such as shellfish, turtles and seabirds, crustaceans like crabs and crayfish and marine mammal remains of seals, dolphins and occasionally whales. Artefacts and hearth and cooking remains are often found in shell midden deposits. Evidence exist that fish were speared, collected by hand, reed baskets and by means of stone fish traps in tidal pools (Mitchell 2002).

Shell midden remains were in the past erroneously assigned to ‘Strandloper cultures’. Deacon & Deacon (1999) explain that ‘no biological or cultural group had exclusive rights to coastal resources.’ Some LSA groups visited the coast periodically while others stayed year round and it is misleading to call them all by the same name. Two primary sources of archaeological enquiry serves to shed more light on the lifestyles of people who accumulated shell middens, one being the analysis of food remains in the middens itself and the other being the analysis of LSA human skeletal remains of people buried either in shell middens or within reasonable proximity to the coast.

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 36

Shell middens vary in character ranging from large sites tens of meters in extent and with considerable depositional depth to fairly small ephemeral collections, easily exposed and destroyed by shifting dune action. Shell middens are also found inland, along rivers where fresh water mussels occur. These middens are often fairly small and less common; in the Eastern Cape often dated to within the past 3,000 years (Deacon & Deacon 1999).

In addition shell middens are not exclusively assigned to LSA cultures; shellfish were exploited during the Last Interglacial, indicating that the practice was most probably continuous for the past 120,000 years (MSA shell middens). Along the coast of KwaZulu-Natal evidence exist for the exploitation of marine food resources by Iron Age communities. These shell middens are easily distinguished from Stone Age middens by particularly rich, often decorated ceramic artefact content. Colonial Period shell middens are quite rare and extremely ephemeral in character; primarily the result of European shipwreck survivors and reported on along the coast of KwaZulu-Natal and the Transkei, Eastern Cape.

For close to 2 millennia people combining cereal agriculture with stock keeping have occupied most of southern Africa’s summer rainfall zone. The rapid spread of farming, distinctive ceramics and metallurgy is understood as the expansion of a Bantu-speaking population, in archaeological terms referred to as the Iron Age.

3.1) The Early Iron Age Ceramic typology is central to current discussions of the expansion of iron using farming communities. The most widely used approach is that of Huffman (1980), who employs a multidimensional analysis (vessel profile, decoration layout and motif) to reconstruct different ceramic types. Huffman (1998) argues that ceramics can be used to trace the movements of people, though not necessarily of specific social or political groupings. Huffman’s Urewe Tradition coincides largely with Phillipson’s (1977) Eastern Stream. A combined Urewe Tradition / Eastern Stream model for the Early Iron Age can be summarized as: 1. The Kwale branch (extending along the coast from Kenya to KwaZulu-Natal); 2. The Nkope branch (located inland and reaching from southern Tanzania through Malawi and eastern Zambia into Zimbabwe); and 3. The Kalundu branch (strething from Angola through western Zambia, Botswana and Zimbabwe into South Africa).

In southern Africa, recent work distinguishes two phases of the Kwale branch: The earlier Silver Leaves facies (250-430AD) occurring as far south as the Northern Province. The later expression or Mzonjani facies (420-580AD) occurs in the Northern Province a well as along the KwaZulu-Natal coastal belt (Huffman 1998). Since the Silver Leaves facies is only slightly younger than the Kwale type site in Kenya, very rapid movement along the coast, perhaps partly by boat, is inferred (Klapwijk 1974). Subsequently (550-650AD) people making Mzonjani derived ceramics settled more widely in the interior of South Africa.

Assemblages attributable to the Nkope branch appear south of the Zambezi but north of South Africa from the 5th Century. Ziwa represents an early facies, with Gokomere deriving jointly from Ziwa and Bambata. A subsequent phase is represented by the Zhizo facies of the Shashe-Limpopo basin, and by Taukome (Huffman 1994). Related sites occur in the Kruger National Park (Meyer 1988). Zhizo (7th – 10th Century) is ancestral to the Toutswe tradition which persisted in eastern Botswana into the 13th Century.

Kalundu origins need further investigation; its subsequent development is however better understood. A post Bambata phase is represented by the 5th – 7th Century sites of Happy Rest, Klein Africa and Maunatlana in the Northern Province and Mpumalanga (Prinsloo 1974, 1989). Later phases are present at the Lydenburg Heads site (Whitelaw & Moon 1996) and by the succession of Mzuluzi, Ndondonwane and Ntshekane in KwaZulu-Natal (7t h – 10th Centuries) (Prins & Grainger 1993). Later Kalundu facies include Klingbeil and Eiland in the northern part of the country (Evers 1980) with Kgopolwe being a lowveld variant in Mpumalanga (10th – 12th Century). Broadhurst and other sites indicate a still later survival in Botswana (Campbell 1991).

Despite the importance accorded to iron agricultural implements in expanding the spread of farming and frequent finds of production debris, metal objects are rare. Metal techniques were simple, with no particular sign of casting, wire drawing or hot working. Jewelry (bangles, beads, pendants etc.) constitute by far the largest number of finds but arrows, adzes, chisels, points and spatulae are known (Miller 1996).

Early Iron Age people were limited to the Miombo and Savannah biomes; excluded from much of the continents western half by aridity and confined in the south during the 1st millennium to bushveld areas of the old Transvaal. Declining summer rainfall restricted occupation to a diminishing belt close to the East Coast and north of S33° (Maggs 1994); sites such as Canasta Place (800AD), Eastern Cape, mark the southern-most limit of Early Iron Age settlement (Nogwaza 1994).

 The Central Cattle Pattern The Central Cattle Pattern (CCP) was the main cognitive pattern since the Early Iron Age (Huffman 1986). The system can be summarized as opposition between male pastoralism and female agriculture; ancestors and descendants; rulers and subjects; and men and women. Cattle served as the primary means of transaction; they represented symbols exchanged for the fertility of wives, legitimacy of children and appeasement of ancestors. Cattle were also used as tribute to rulers confirming sub-ordination and redistribution as loan cattle by the ruler to gain political support. Cattle represented healing and fertilizing qualities (Huffman 1998; Kuper 1980).

This cognitive and conceptual structure underlies all cultural behavior, including the placement of features in a settlement. The oppositions of male and female, pastoralism and agriculture, ancestors and descendants, rulers and subjects, cool and hot are represented in spatial oppositions, either concentric or diametric (Huffman 1986).

A typical CCP village comprise of a central cattle enclosure (byre) where men are buried. The Kgotla (men's meeting place / court) is situated adjacent to the cattle enclosure. Surrounding the enclosure is an arc of houses, occupied according to seniority. Around the outer perimeter of the houses is an arc of granaries where women keep their pots and grinding stones (Huffman 1986). The model varies per ethnic group which helps to distinguish ethnicity throughout the Iron Age, but more studies are required to recognize the patterns.

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 37

3.2) The Middle Iron Age The hiatus of South African Middle Iron Age activity was centered in the Shashe-Limpopo Valley and characterized by the 5-tier hierarchical Mapungubwe State spanning some 30,000km². By the 1st millennium ivory and skins were already exported overseas, with sites like Sofala and Chibuene, Mosambique, interfacing between interior and transoceanic traders. Exotic glass beads, cloth and Middle Eastern ceramics present at southern African sites mark the beginning of the regions incorporation into the expanding economic system that, partly tied together with maritime trading links across the Indian Ocean, increasingly united Africa, Asia and Europe long before Da Gama or Columbus (Eloff & Meyer 1981; Meyer 1998).

Occupation was initially focused at Bambandanyalo and K2. The Bambananyalo main midden (1030-1220AD) stands out above the surrounding area, reaching more than 6m in places and covering more than 8ha the site may have housed as many as 2,000 people (Meyer 1998). The CCP was not strictly followed; whether this is ideologically significant or merely a reflection of local typography remains unclear. The midden, the size of which may reflect the status of the settlement’s ruler, engulfed the byre around 1060-1080AD, necessitating relocation of the cattle previously kept there. The re-organization of space and worldview implied suggests profound social changes even before the sites’ abandonment in the early 13th century, when the focus of occupation moved to Mapungubwe Hill, 1 km away (Huffman 1998).

Excavations at Mapungubwe Hill, though only occupied for a few decades (1220-1290AD), yielded a deep succession of gravel floors and house debris (Eloff & Meyer 1981). Huffman (1998) suggests that the suddenness with which Mapungubwe was occupied may imply a deliberate decision to give spatial expression to a new social order in which leaders physically removed themselves from ordinary people by moving onto more inaccessible, higher elevations behind the stone walls demarcating elite residential areas. Social and settlement changes speak of considerable centralization of power and perhaps the elaboration of new ways of linking leaders and subjects.

At Bambandanyalo and Mapungubwe elite burial grave goods include copper, bone, ivory and golden ornaments and beads. Social significance of cattle is reinforced by their importance among the many human and animal ceramic figurines and at least 6 ‘beast burials’ (Meyer 1998).

Today the drought prone Shashe-Limpopo Valley receives less than 350mm of rainfall per annum, making cereal cultivation virtually impossible. The shift to drier conditions in the late 1200’s across the Shashe-Limpopo basin and the eastern Kalahari may have been pivotal in the break-up of the Mapungubwe polity, the collapse of Botswana’s Toutswe tradition and the emergence of Great Zimbabwe (1220-1550AD), southern Africa’s best known and largest (720ha) archaeological site (Meyer 1998).

South of the Limpopo and north of the Soutpansberg, Mapungubwe derived communities survived into the 14th Century, contemporary with the establishment of Sotho-speaking makers of Maloko pottery.

3.3) The Later Iron Age South African farming communities of the 2nd millennium experienced increased specialization of production and exchange, the development of more nucleated settlement patterns and growing political centralization, albeit not to the same extent as those participating in the Zimbabwe tradition. However, together they form the background to the cataclysmic events of the late 18th / early 19th Century Mfecane (Mitchell 2002).

Archaeological evidence of settlement pattern, social organization and ritual practice often differ from those recorded ethnographically. The Moloko ceramic tradition seems to be ancestral to modern Sotho-Tswana speakers (Evers 1980) and from about 1,100AD a second tradition, the Blackburn tradition, appears along South Africa’s eastern coastline. Blackburn produced mostly undecorated pottery (Davies 1971), while Mpambanyoni assemblages, reaching as far south as Transkei, includes examples of rim notching, incised lines and burnished ochre slip (Robey 1980). At present, no contemporary farming sites are known further inland in KwaZulu-Natal or the Eastern Cape.

Huffman (1989) argues that similarities between Blackburn and early Maloko wares imply a related origin, presumably in the Chifumbaze of Zambia or the Ivuna of Tanzania, which contains a range of ceramic attributes important in the Blackburn as well as beehive grass huts similar to those made by the Nguni. This is one of the few suggestions of contact between Sotho-Tswana and Nguni speakers on the one hand and farming communities who, if Huffman is correct, were already long established south of the Limpopo. Both ethnographic and archaeological data demonstrate that Sotho-Tswana and Nguni are patrilineal and organize their settlements according to the CCP (Kuper 1980).

From 1,300AD there is increasing evidence for the beginning of agro-pastoralist expansion considerably beyond the area of previous occupation. It is also to this time that the genealogies of several contemporary Bantu speaking groups can be traced (Wilson & Thompson 1969). Associated with this expansion was the regular employment of stone, rather than wood, as building material, an adaptation that has greatly facilitated the discovery and identification of settlements. Maggs (1976) describes 4 basic settlement types all characterized by the use of semi weathered dolorite to produce hard binding daga for house floors and a wall building tradition employing larger more regular stones for the inner and outer faces and smaller rubble for the infill. As with the more dispersed homesteads of KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape, sites tend to be in locally elevated situations, reflecting a deep seated Sotho and Nguni preference for benign higher places rather than supernaturally dangerous riverside localities; another important contrast to both 1st millennium (Maggs 1976) and later Zulu Kingdom settlement patterns (Hall & Maggs 1979).

The lack of evidence for iron production in the interior and eastern part of South Africa emphasize exchange relationships between various groups and associated more centralized polities. By the 19th Century iron production in KwaZulu-Natal was concentrated in particular clans and lineages and associated with a range of social and religious taboos (Maggs 1992). South of Durban comparatively few smelting sites are known (Whitelaw 1991), a trend even more apparent in Transkei (Feely 1987). However, metal remained the most important and archaeologically evident item traded between later farming communities. (Other recorded trade items include glass and ostrich eggshell beads; Indian Ocean seashells; siltstone pipes; dagga, and later on tobacco; pigments including ochre, graphite and specularite; hides and salt.)

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 38

Rising polity settlements are particularly evident in the north of the country and dated to the 17th Century, including Molokwane, capital of the Bakwena chiefdom (Pistorius 1994) and Kaditshwene, capital of a major section of the Hurutshe, whose population of 20,000 in 1820 almost equals contemporary Cape Town in size (Boeyens 2000). The agglomeration of Tswana settlements in the north of the country was fuelled by both population growth and conflict over access to elephant herds for ivory and long distance trade with the East Coast. During this period ceramic decoration became blander and more standardized than the earlier elaborate decoration that included red ochre and graphite coloring.

The Mfecane refers to the wars and population movements of the early 19th Century which culminated in the establishment of the Zulu Kingdom and came to affect much of the interior, even beyond the Zambezi: The late 18th Century was marked by increasing demands for ivory (and slaves) on the part of European traders at Delagoa Bay; as many as 50 tons of ivory were exported annually from 1750-1790. As elephant populations declined, competition increased both for them and for the post 1790 supply of food to European and American whalers calling at Delagoa Bay (Smith 1970). Cattle raiding, conflict over land and changes in climatic and subsistence strategies characterized much of the cultural landscape of the time.

Competition for access to overseas trade encouraged some leaders to replace locally organized circumcision schools and age-sets with more permanently maintained military regiments. These were now used to gain access through warfare to land, cattle and stored food. By 1810 three groups, the Mthethwa, Ndwandwe and Ngwane dominated northern KwaZulu-Natal (Wright 1995). The Mthethwa paramountcy was undermined by the killing of its leader Dingiswayo in circa 1818, which led to a brief period of Ndwandwe dominance. In consequence one of Dingiswayo’s former tributaries, Shaka, established often forceful alliances with chiefdoms further south. Shaka’s Zulu dominated coalition resisted the Ndwandwe who in return fled to Mozambique. As the Zulu polity expanded it consolidated its control over large areas, incorporating many communities into it. Others sought refuge from political instability by moving south of the Thukela River, precipitating a further domino effect as far as the Cape Colony’s eastern border (Wright 1995).

In the 15th Century Admiral Zheng He and his subordinates impressed the power of the Ming Dynasty rulers in a series of voyages as far afield as Java, Sri Lanka, southern Arabia and along the East African coast, collecting exotic animals en route. But nothing more came of his expeditions and China never pursued opportunities for trade or colonization (Mote 1991).

Portuguese maritime expansion began around the time of Zheng He’s voyages; motivated by a desire to establish a sea route to the riches of the Far East. By 1485 Diogo Cao had reached Cape Cross, 3 years later Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope and less than a decade later Vasco da Gama called at several places along South Africa’s coast, trading with Khoekhoen (Khoi) at Mossel Bay before reaching Mozambique and crossing the ocean to India. His voyage initiated subsequent Portuguese bases from China to Iraq. In Africa interest was focused on seizing important coastal trading towns such as Sofala and gaining access to the gold of Zimbabwe. Following the 1510 Portuguese-Khoekhoen battle at Table Bay, in which the viceroy of India was killed, Portuguese ships ceased to call along the South African coast (Elphick 1985).

A number of shipwrecks, primarily along the eastern coast attest to Portuguese activity including the Sao Joao, wrecked in 1552 near Port Edward and the Sao Bento, destroyed in 1554 off the Transkei coast. Survivors’ accounts provided the 1st detailed information on Africa’s inhabitants (Auret & Maggs 1982).

By the late 1500’s Portuguese supremacy of the Indian Ocean was threatened. From 1591 numerous Dutch and English ships called at Table Bay and in 1652 the Dutch East Indian Company (VOC) established a permanent base, with the intent to provide fresh food and water to VOC ships. In an attempt to improve the food supply a few settlers (free burghers) were allowed to establish farms. The establishment of an intensive mixed farming economy failed due to shortages of capital and labor, and free burghers turned to wheat cultivation and livestock farming. While the population grew slowly the area of settlement expanded rapidly with new administrative centers established at Stellenbosch (1676), Swellendam (1743) and Graaf-Reinet (1785). By the 1960’s the Colony’s frontier was too long to be effectively policed by VOC officials (Elphick 1985).

From the 1700’s many settlers expanded inland over the Cape Fold Mountain Belt. The high cost of overland transport constrained the ability to sell their produce while settlement of the interior was increasingly made difficult by resident KhoiSan groups, contributing due to a lack of VOC military support to growing Company opposition in the years before British control of the Cape (1795 / 1806) (Davenport & Saunders 2000).

In 1820 a major British settlement was implanted on the eastern frontier of the Cape Colony, resulting in large numbers of the community moving into the interior, initially to KwaZulu-Natal, and then after Britain annexed Natal (1843), further into the interior to beyond the Vaal River. Disruptions of the Mfecane eased their takeover of African lands and the Boers (farmers) established several Republics. A few years later the 2nd South African War saw both the South African and Orange Free State Republics annexed by Britain, a move largely motivated by British desire to control the goldfields of the Witwatersrand. With adjacent regions of the sub-continent also falling, directly or indirectly, under British rule and German colonization of Namibia, European control of the whole of southern Africa was firmly established before the 1st World War (Davenport & Saunders 2000).

 Xhosa Iron Age Cultures meets Colonists in the Eastern Cape

From the late 1600’s conflict between migrants from the Cape (predominantly Boers) and Xhosa people in the region of the Fish River were strife, ultimately resulting in a series of 9 Frontier Wars (1702-1878) (Milton 1983). Both cultures were heavily based and reliant on agriculture and cattle farming. As more Cape migrants, and later settlers from Britain (1820) and elsewhere arrived, population pressures and competition over land, cattle and good grazing became intense. Cattle raiding became endemic on all sides, with retaliatory raids launched in response. As missionaries arrived with evangelical messages, confrontations with hostile chiefs who saw them as undermining traditional Xhosa ways of life resulted in conflicts which flared into wars.

As pressures between the European settlers and the Xhosa grew, settlers organized themselves into local militia, counteracted by Xhosa warring skills: But both sides were limited by the demands of seasonal farming and the need for labor during harvest. Wars between the Boers and the Xhosa resulted in shifting borders, from the Fish to the Sundays River, but it was only after the British annexed the Cape in 1806 that authorities turned their attention to the Eastern

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 39

regions and petitions by the settlers about Xhosa raids. British expeditions, in particular under Colonel John Graham in 1811 and later Harry Smith in 1834, were sent not only to secure the frontier against the Xhosa, but also to impose British authority on the settlers, with the aim to establish a permanent British presence. Military forts were built and permanently manned. Over time the British came to dominate the area both militarily and through occupation with the introduction of British settlers. The imposition of British authority led to confrontations not only with the Xhosa but also with disaffected Boers and other settlers, and other native groups such as the Khoikhoi, the Griqua and the Mpondo. The frontier wars continued over a period of about 150 years; from the 1st arrival of the Cape settlers, and with the intervention of the British military ultimately ending in the subjugation of the Xhosa people. Fighting ended on the Eastern Cape frontier in June 1878 with the annexation of the western areas of the Transkei and administration under the authority of the Cape Colony (Milton 1983).

 The Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution refers roughly to the period between the 18th - 19th Centuries, typified by major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transport, and technology. Changing industry had a profound effect on socio-economic and socio-cultural conditions across the world: The Industrial Revolution marks a major turning point in human history; almost every aspect of daily life was eventually influenced in some way. Average income and population size began to exhibit unprecedented growth; in the two centuries following 1800 the world's population increased over 6-fold, associated with increasing urbanization and demand of resources. Starting in the latter part of the 18th century, the transition from manual labor towards machine-based manufacturing changed the face of economic activity; including the mechanization of the textile industries, the development of iron-making techniques and the increased use of refined coal. Trade expansion was enabled by the introduction of canals, improved roads and railways. The introduction of steam power fuelled primarily by coal and powered machinery was underpinned by dramatic increases in production capacity. The development of all-metal machine tools in the first two decades of the 19th century facilitated the manufacture of more production machines in other industries (More 2000).

Effects of the Industrial Revolution were widespread across the world, with its enormous impact of change on society, a process that continues today as ‘industrialization’.

1. Aitken, M.J., Stringer, C.B. & Mellars, P.A. (eds). 1993. The origin of modern humans and the impact of chronometric dating. Princeton: Princeton University Press 2. Auret, C. & Maggs, T.M.O’C 1982. The great ship São Bento: remains from a mid-sixteenth century Portuguese wreck on the Pondoland coast. Annals of the Natal Museum 25:1-39 3. Beaumont, P.B. 1973. The ancient pigment mines of South Africa. South African Journal of Science 69: 41-46 4. Binneman, J.N.F. & Beaumont, P.B. 1992. Use-wear analysis of two Acheulean handaxes from Wonderwerk Cave, Northern Cape. South African Field Archaeology 1:92-97 5. Boeyens, J.C.A. 2000. In search of Kadishwene. South African Archaeological Bulletin 55:3-17 6. Brauer, G. 1982. Early anatomically modern man in Africa and the replacement of the Mediterranean and European Neanderthals. In De Lumley, H. (ed) L’Home erectus et la place de l’homme de tautavel parmi les hominids fossils. Nice: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique 7. Cann, R.L., Rickards, O. & Lum, J.K. 1994. Mitochondrial DNA and human evolution: our one lucky mother. Nature 325: 31-36 8. Campbell, A.C. 1991. The riddle of the stone walls. Botswana Notes and Records 23:243-249 9. Clarke, R.J. 1999. A discovery of complete arm and hand of the 3.3 million year old Australopithecus skeleton from Sterkfontein. South African Journal of Science 95:447-480 10. Dart, R.A. 1925. Australopithecus africanus: the man-ape of South Africa. Nature 115:195-199 11. Davenport, T.R.H. & Saunders, C. 2000. South Africa: A modern history. London: Macmillan 12. Davies, O. 1971. Excavations at Blackburn. South African Archaeological Bulletin 26: 165-178 13. Deacon, H.J. 1970. The Acheulian occupation at Amanzi Springs, Uitenhage District, Cape Province. Annals of the Cape Provincial Museums 8:89-189 14. Deacon, J. 1984. Later Stone Age people and their descendants in southern Africa. In Klein, R.G. (ed). Southern Africa prehistory and paleoenvironments. Rotterdam: A.A. Balkema 15. Deacon, H.J. & Deacon., J. 1999. Human Beginnings in South Africa. Uncovering the Secrets of the Stone Age. Cape Town: David Phillip Publlishers 16. Deacon, J. & Dowson, A.D. (eds.) 2001. Voices from the past. /Xam Bushmen and the Bleek and Lloyd Collection. Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press 17. Eloff, J.F. & Meyer, A. 1981. The Greefswald sites. In Voigt, E.A. (ed) Guide to archaeological sites in the northern and eastern Transvaal. Pretoria: South African Association of Archaeologists 18. Elphick, R. 1985. Khoikhoi and the founding of white South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press 19. Evers, T.M. 1980. Klingbeil Early Iron Age sites, Lydenburg, Eastern Transvaal, South Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin 35:46-57 20. Feeley, .M. 1987. The early farmers of Transkei, southern Africa, before AD 1870. Oxford: British Archaeology Reports 21. Foley, R.A & Lahr, M.M. 1997. Mode 3 technologies and the evolution of modern humans. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 7:3-36 22. Goodwin A.J.H. & van Riet Lowe, C. 1929. The Stone Age cultures of South Africa. Annals of the South African Museum 27:1-289 23. Hall, M. & Maggs, T.M.O’C. 1979. Nqabeni: a later Iron Age site in Zululand. South African Archaeological Society Goodwin Series 3:159-176 24. Hensilwood, C. & Sealy, J.C. 1997. Bone artefacts from the Middle Stone Age at Blombos Cave, southern Cape, South Africa. Current Anthropology 38:390- 395 25. Huffman, T.N. 1980. Ceramics, Classification and Iron Age Entities. African Studies 39:123-174 26. Huffman, T.N. 1989. Ceramics, Settlements and Late Iron Age Migrations. African Archaeological Review 7: 155-182 27. Huffman, T.N. 1986. Iron Age Settlement Patterns and the Origin of Class Distinction in Southern Africa. Advances in World Archaeology 5:291-338 28. Huffman, T.N. 1994. Toteng Pottery and the Origins of Bambata. Southern African Field Archaeology 3:3-9 29. Huffman, T.N. 1998. The Antiquity of Lobola. South African Archaeological Bulletin 53:57-62 30. Keyser, A., Menter, C.G., Moggi-Cheggi, J., Pickering T.R, & Berger, L.R. 2000. Drimolen: A New Hominid Bearing Site in Gauteng, South Africa. South African Journal of Science 96:193-197 31. Klapwijk, M. 1974. A Preliminary Report on Pottery from the North-Eastern Transvaal, South Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin 29:19-23 32. Klein, R.G. 1999. The Human Career: Human Biological and Cultural Origins. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 33. Kuman, K, Field, A.S. & Thackeray, J.F. 1997. Discovery of New Artefacts at Kromdraai. South African Journal of Science 93: 187-193 34. Kuper, A. 1980. Symbolic Dimensions of the Southern Bantu Homestead. Africa 1:8-23 35. Leakey, M.G., Feibel, C.S., McDougall, I & Walker, A.C. 1995. New Four-Million-Year-Old Hominid Species from Kanopi and Allia Bay, Kenya. Nature 376:565-57

Phase 1 AIA – Proposed Construction of the Needs Camp / Potsdam Bridge and Access Road, (near East London), BCMM, EC 40

’ ’‘’’ ’ ’

– 41

“”– … “” – “” “”– “” “” “”

– – –

– 42

– –

– – –

– – ²

– 43

² – … –

–